The present invention relates to medicine organizers and modular systems, including smart wireless devices such as smart phones or tablets that can communicate with one or more medicine storage devices and methods for monitoring and increasing patient compliance with regard to timely and accurate dispensing of medicines.
Many people take one or more medicine or supplements, such as minerals or vitamins, several times a day to maintain or improve their health. Often, these medications or supplements must be taken at specific times each day. If medications or supplements are not taken at the proper times, individual health may be jeopardized. For example, failure to take a prescribed medication for treatment of heart disease can result in severe health consequences such as a heart attack or stroke. Similarly, patients that seek to take extra doses before the prescribed time interval can be in danger of an overdose. Non-compliance with a prescribed dose regimen includes patients who fail to take a dose at a prescribed time or patients who take one or more extra doses that are not in compliance with the minimum time between dose of the particular prescription or label instructions for ingestion.
Further, non-compliance with a prescribed regimen of one or more medications, particularly in the elderly and the aging population of “baby boomers”, can result in billions of dollars of unnecessary health care costs.
Many people who take one or more medication or supplement a day are able to take medications or supplements without assistance. However, many people who take one or more medication or supplement a day require a reminder or the assistance of a care taker. Care takers may be one or more members of the patient's family or other individuals, such as friends, nurses, nurse's aids and the like. It can be difficult for a patient or a care taker to organize a patient's medications or supplements to insure compliance with a predetermined schedule. Further, it can be extremely difficult to monitor compliance with multiple medication schedules. Failure to properly monitor compliance can result in catastrophic health consequences to the patient and high levels of care taker anxiety, which can also lead to increased health problems for care givers.
The present invention provides novel methods and structures for improving the overall ease of compliance with a programmable schedule for reminding a patient to take one or more medications or supplements.
Improved medicine organizers comprising smart wireless devices such as smart phones and tablets having programmable software that can communicate with one or more medicine dispenser and methods for monitoring and improving patient compliance with medication schedules are disclosed herein.